Benefits of Climate Policy: Improving Information for Policy Makers, Paris, 12-13 December 2002

Benefits of climate policies are an important determinant of the level, type and timing of policies that governments will undertake to address climate change. This OECD project aims to improve information for climate policy makers by outlining a conceptual framework to assess benefits (avoided impacts) at different levels of mitigation. Workshop papers focus on direct mitigation policy benefits, though some also cover ancillary benefits as well as the interaction of adaptation and mitigation. Discussions also identified gaps in existing information, methods and analyses that inhibit complete assessment and recommended areas for policy-relevant research. Workshop documents are available here with the objective to widely disseminate the ideas they contain and to facilitate the input to the project.

Download the  Summary Report.

Agenda

Workshop Chair: Ken Ruffing, Acting Head, OECD Environment Directorate

I. WELCOME AND INTRODUCTION

• Welcome, meeting objectives and background
  by Tom Jones, Head of Division, Global and Structural Policies, OECD Environment Directorate
  
  
• A UNFCCC perspective on benefits issues
  by Dennis Tirpak, UNFCCC Secretariat
  
  
• Dealing with benefits in the IPCC Fourth Assessment Report
  by Martin Parry, IPCC Co-Chair of Working Group II

II. UNDERSTANDING IMPACTS, DAMAGE COSTS AND BENEFITS OF MITIGATION POLICY

• Background paper: Estimating Global Impacts from Climate Change
  by Joel Smith and Sam Hitz, Stratus Consulting Inc., Colorado, United States
  
  Discussants: Petra Mahrenholz, Federal Environmental Agency (UBA), Germany; Ademar Ribeiro Romeiro, State University of Campinas/SP, Brazil
  
  
• Uncertainty in climate change predictions
  by Geoff Jenkins, Hadley Centre for Climate Prediction and Research, United Kingdom
  
  
• Modelling climate change under no-policy and policy emissions pathways
  by Tom Wigley, National Center for Atmospheric Research (NCAR), Colorado, United States
  
  
• Managing Societal Transitions: Dilemmas and Uncertainties: The Dutch energy case-study
  by Jan Rotmans, International Centre for Integrative Studies (ICIS), Maastricht, Netherlands
  
  Discussant: Roger Jones, Managing Climate Change Risks, CSIRO Atmospheric Research, Aspendale, Australia; Stephen Schneider

III. ESTIMATING BENEFITS

a) NON-MARKET IMPACTS

• Estimating Non-Market Impacts of Climate Change and Climate Policy
  by Dale Rothman, International Centre for Integrative Studies (ICIS), Maastricht, Netherlands
  
  
• Analysing changes in ecosystems for different levels of climate change
  by Rik Leemans, National Institute of Public Health and the Environment (RIVM), Netherlands
  
  Discussants: Michele Pittini, Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Defra), United Kingdom; Michael Hanemann

b) MARKET IMPACTS

• Market benefits/impacts
  by Michael Hanemann, University of California at Berkeley, United States
  
  
• Estimating benefits: other issues concerning market impacts
  by Gary Yohe, Wesleyan University, Connecticut, United States
  
  Discussants: Philippe Ambrosi, CIRED, France; Mac Callaway

c) CROSS-CUTTING ISSUES

• Case study on sea-level rise impacts
  by Robert Nicholls, Middlesex University, United Kingdom
  
  
• Abrupt Non-Linear Climate Change, Irreversibility and Surprise
  by Stephen Schneider, Stanford University, California
  
  Discussants: Lynda Danquah, Environment Canada; Jan Rotmans
  
  
• Ancillary benefits issues of mitigation
  The Forgotten Benefits of Climate Change Mitigation: Innovation, Technological Leapfrogging, Employment, and Sustainable Development
  by Eberhard Jochem, Fraunhofer-Institut für Systemtechnik und Innovationsforschung (ISI), Karlsruhe, Germany
  
  Discussant: David O'Connor, OECD Development Centre
  
  Related OECD document: Ancillary Benefits and Costs of GHG Mitigation Policy Conclusions
  
  
• Adaptation benefits and costs - measurement and policy issues
  by Mac Callaway, UNEP Collaborating Centre on Energy and Environment, Denmark
  
  Discussant: Merylyn McKenzie Hedger, Environment Agency, United Kingdom
  
  
• Distributional Aspects of Climate Change Impacts
  by Richard Tol, Hamburg University, Germany
  
  Discussant: Farhana Yamin, FIELD, United Kingdom

IV. USING INFORMATION ON BENEFITS AND COSTS FOR POLICY ASSESSMENT

• What do we know about climate policy costs and how can we learn more?
  by Hadi Dowlatabadi, University of British Columbia, Canada
  
  
• Trade-offs among greenhouse gases
  by Richard G. Richels, Electrical Power Research Institute (EPRI), California, United States
  
  Discussant: Andre van Moor, RIVM, Netherlands
  
  
• Developments in integrated assessment: the co-productive approach
  by John Schellnhuber, Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research (PIK), Germany and Tyndall Centre for Climate Change Research, United Kingdom
  
  
• Informing climate policy given incommensurable benefit estimates
  by Henry Jacoby, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, United States
  
  Discussant: Anand Patwardhan, Indian Institute of Technology, Bombay, India; Rich Richels

V. WRAP-UP SESSION- DISCUSSION

• Assessing benefits: towards a conceptual framework and priorities for policy-related research
  by Jan Corfee-Morlot, Global and Structural Policies Division, OECD Environment Directorate
  
  
• Concluding remarks
  by Ken Ruffing, Workshop Chair

SUMMARY COMMENTS FROM WORKSHOP PARTICIPANTS:

• Lynda Danquah, Canada
• Tana Stratton, Canada
• Harald Neitzel, Germany

Project Manager: Jan Corfee Morlot (jan.corfee-morlot@oecd.org)